THUNDER BAY – Thunder Bay’s regional hospital will continue requiring staff, patients, and visitors to mask up.
Hospital leadership said while the provincial government may be lifting its mask mandate for hospitals and most other health care settings this weekend, the policy remains essential to protect vulnerable patients.
“We feel it’s of the utmost importance with the volumes of patients we see daily,” said chief of staff Bradley Jacobson. “We’re looking at people with organ transplants who are immunocompromised, people with cancer treatments who are just very vulnerable to opportunistic infections, as well as the extremes of age – newborns and the elderly coming in from nursing homes.”
Going forward, the hospital will monitor local and provincial COVID trends, the number of infections in hospital, and other factors as they review the mandate.
The policy will likely remain in place for the foreseeable future, Jacobson indicated.
He believes the pandemic has also created a culture change that will see many health care workers continue masking even when mandates lift.
“Whether or not it will mandated for staff [in the long run], I’m unsure, but my [feeling] is that a number of health care providers have committed to wearing masks moving forward indefinitely.”
Jacobson said evidence points to the effectiveness of the masking policy, with infection rates slowing not just for COVID but many other viruses in jurisdictions where masks are commonly worn.
“We’ve seen significant decreases globally with the spread of any type of respiratory illness,” he said. “This is paramount for the prevention of spread of COVID especially during the pandemic.”
A majority of other Ontario hospitals, and all Northwestern Ontario hospitals, will also keep mandates in place for now, Jacobsen said.
He conceded masking policies are a “delicate issue,” but said there have been “very few instances” of people refusing to comply with the rule.
As of Wednesday, there were 28 patients admitted to TBRHSC who were positive for COVID-19, with two of those in the Intensive Care Unit. The hospital will also continue testing all admitted patients for COVID.
